I was 19. I went with a guy who is still my good friend to this day, and two other guys we went to High School with, to see the ‘International Freedom Festival’ fireworks display on the Detroit River. We went to the Canadian side of the river since we were old enough to drink in Canada.
When it was over, we were walking with the rest of the crowd back up to the street, which was a little ways up on a rise from the river. We encountered a guy who was angrily yelling and acting threatening to a young woman, getting all in her face. My friend valiantly got in between them and told the guy to settle down. Seemed like he defused the situation, and we continued walking back to the street. My friend was a little ways ahead of me, so when I cleared the rise and got to the street I saw the aggressive guy had decided to confront my friend at the street level.
He was making these ‘karate moves’ which seemed to be fake posturing at first, but he started actually fighting my friend, who seemed to be holding his own at first, but after a minute or two the ‘karate guy’ had gotten my friend on the ground and was repeatedly punching him in the face. His head was bouncing off the pavement.
I’m no fighter, but I was concerned my friend would get really hurt. Of the other two guys we were with, one was big, over 6’ tall, and the other supposedly also knew karate. Both stood there just watching, not doing a thing. So I grabbed ‘karate guy’ in a headlock and pulled him off my friend. He struggled, but could not break free of my arm around his neck. I thought, “what do I do with this guy now?!?”
Suddenly a couple friends of ‘karate guy’ appeared from somewhere (we hadn’t even seen him with anybody up to that point) and one popped me in the face a couple times. I let go of ‘karate guy’ and they disappeared into the crowd.
Funny thing was, after that, the two other guys we were with, who had done exactly nothing to help at the time, excitedly talked in detail afterward about all the badass things they were about to do…
Does sexual assault count? Most responses here seem to be interpreting “attack” in the sense of “anger-fueled violent aggression”, and I’m fine with sticking with that narrower meaning.
Just about every day at work! I’m in healthcare and work with dementia patients. You learn to keep at an arms distance and have a clear escape. Probably not good for my anxiety lol.
I think the “random stranger” bit is the key qualification.
Whether the random stranger tries to punch your nose or feel your crotch it’s still an assault by a random stranger. Conversely a first date or classmate who isn’t willing to take “no” for an answer is something other than a “random stranger”.
I’ll also note that substantially everyone who’s posted an anecdote has been male. So that selection bias probably leans towards criminal rowdiness in public, rather that sexual rowdiness in semi-private.
I grew up in a small town. When I was a kid, a carnival came to town. I was supposed to meet some friends there, but they didn’t show. I walked around and watched people at the game booths playing ring toss, duck hunt, etc. I came to one booth where the attendant was explaining the game to somebody, and he all the sudden went postal and shouted “get the fuck out of here asshole” and threw something at me. I ran off and he continued cursing at me. I have no idea what I did to set him off.
I was riding my bike and got roughly shoved by a sketchy-looking person as I rode by. I assume was an attempt to make me fall off so the fellow could steal my bike. Luckily my balance was good and I had enough inertia to swerve and continue on my way.
I had a guy paw my leg under my skirt on the subway, once. I was en route to a job interview, and it was somewhat disconcerting. But it was a crowded subway car, and I moved to the other end and that was enough to keep him at bay for the rest of the trip.
I’ve had two time when I thought I might be randomly assaulted. One by a homeless guy on the subway who probably wasn’t sober. I had been sitting on the train, minding my business, when he came up to me. I was grateful that his thin clothing clearly revealed that he didn’t have a gun or a large knife. A young Black man nearby chased him away on my behalf. I was grateful. Another time, as my husband and I were walking on a short-but-empty block, a guy came up to us and started talking about how easy it would be to mug us. But we emerged unscatched at the end of the empty block, and despite the stories, muggers rarely operate in full view of crowds.
I like being around drunk and high people. For the most part. And this is coming from someone who doesn’t drink a lot. In fact, when I went to that performance I was more excited about the adorbs than the booze. We only had chips, but the people sitting behind us had triscuit with fancy/expensive cheese and red grapes.
Alcohol makes people more sociable, and less inhibited. That’s fun. Maybe I’m biased. I’m sociable and uninhibited without alcohol. I feel less lonely. Yeah, I can do without the fights though.
My grandma who had dementia assaulted a nurse less than a week after going into a nursing facility. When me and my mom checked on my grandma, an administrator told us about it. She apparently smacked a nurse in the forehead with the heel of her shoe. I thought the admin was being bogus…until I saw a nurse with a bruise on her forehead the shape of my grandma’s shoe heel.
I had an alcoholic father who spent 90% of his caregiving time with me, in bars. Nothing really traumatic happened but it was a sad place to be. Don’t like loudness, noisiness or aggressive people. Large groups of drunk people make everything very unpredictable.
I do like drinking very occasionally but prefer to be with friends only.
I’ve had it happen to me twice. Both times occurred in small towns in West Virginia, within a one or a couple or three years of each othe,weirdly enough, and long ago enough that I don’t remember which incident happened first.
One night I was going to a friend’s house for a party, when a car stopped and a short guy I’d never met before, about my age (early to mid 20s), got out of the front passenger door and offered me a drink from a quart of beer. I accepted the offer, but when I had lifted the bottle to my lips, the fucker slugged me in the face hard enough to make me stagger. He jumped back in the car and slammed the door in what seemed like half a second, and the driver took off. The two of them laughed, raucously, until the car was out of sight.
The other time took place less than a quarter mile from my teenage home, and more than 100 miles from the first place I mentioned. I was ambling along toward my house from somewhere sometime in the afternoon, thinking about lunch, when a guy I barely recognized and remembered vaguely as someone who used to come by my house occasionally to “playfully” rough me up when we were kids, and whom I hadn’t seen for years, walked up in the other direction. When he got close enough he said “Hi! Remember me?” and then decked me all of a sudden. Right in the face and right in the street! He brayed “How’s it going, man?” and continued on toward wherever the Hell he was going. Shocked and too scared to be pissed off yet, I hurried home. Told my parents what had happened to me, but there really wasn’t a lot they could do about it.
To me, the odd part was both events happening within a year or three of each other. I guess I had a punchable face when I was a youth.
Just curious, as I don’t have any sons or brothers. Would this be typical behavior for a 20-ish year old guy? I mean taking a drink of beer from a bottle that was handed to him by a stranger?
I’ve mentioned this before, but as I was walking home past a pub, two guys got into it. One raised a wine bottle to clobber the other one. As he tried to bring the bottle down on the guy’s head, it slipped out of his hand, shot about 10 feet, and hit me smack in the middle of my forehead. I got 7 stitches, he got a few from a smack from the other guy. The ER doctor, once he learned what happened, gave me a local anesthetic before the stitches. The guy who hit me got nothing.
I have long stopped hanging in bars, and except for a short time when I was working at a publisher that held the “editorial meetings” in the bar, have never spent a lot of time in them. I’m usually bored by drunks.
Well, yeah, I was a friendly young drunk who might’ve offered a pull from my quart to a stranger who looked like a fellow partyer if the situation arose.
Downtown San Jose is separated from the Caltrain station by a river which is a magnet for homeless and crazies. I worked in downtown and commuted by train, which meant a twice-daily walk through this danger zone.
One afternoon I was walking alone on a block on my way to the train station, and approaching me from the other direction was a guy who looked furious - his fists were clenched and he was cursing and snarling. I glanced behind me to see if there was anyone else within helping distance, and the guy bellowed at me from a few feet away, “WHY THE HELL DID YOU DO THAT?!”
I jumped away from him and quickly made my way to where there were a lot of people, the train station. And THAT was the last day I commuted via train. After that I drove in in my car. Sorry, air quality control folks. It’s not worth it if I get threatened by street crazies.
